I’ll Follow the Sun
One of Paul’s earliest songs gets a reboot
I wrote that in my front parlour in Forthlin Road. I was about 16.
In the summer of 1960, the eighteen-year-old Paul McCartney was playing long sets of loud rock and roll in Hamburg. He relaxed during the breaks by playing the stage piano, casually informing those around him, ‘I’ve written a song.’
In fact, Paul had in fact written I’ll Follow the Sun two years earlier. He later recalled:
‘I’ll Follow The Sun’ was one of those very early ones. I seem to remember writing it just after I’d had the flu….I remember standing in the parlour, with my guitar, looking out through the lace curtains
The song announced a precocious teenage talent. Its opening chord sequence (I, V, IV I) is standard but the melodic sequence of rising fourths is immediately appealing, instantly memorable. But would it work in the bear-pit that was Kaiserkeller?
In Hamburg, Paul ultimately decided that I’ll Follow the Sun was too off-brand for the stage set. But by 1964 the Lennon and McCartney song factory was running low on stock. With a Christmas album release, Beatles for Sale looming, McCartney decided he could upcycle that old/new song.
Evolution
There is a bootleg demo, apparently recorded in the bathroom of Paul’s family home in April 1960. This has an impromptu feel, with mumbled lyrics and short Harrison guitar break.
For the reworked 1964 version there are substantial changes. The boilerplate male brashness of the original lyric is toned down and a more rueful tone introduced. The singer may be a girl-in-every-port old school womaniser but he is a (mildly) regretful roué. This perhaps a response to two singles in a similar mode, Marvin Gaye’s Wherever I Lay My Hat and Bob Dylan’s Don’t Think Twice, both released in 1962,
The ambiguous title/hook fitted well the new theme, while the changes in the arrangement brought out the tension between the rising and descending musical figures. This conflict is also present between the warmth of the lullaby-like vocal delivery and the passive aggressive words:
One day you’ll find that I have gone
But tomorrow may rain, so
I’ll follow the sun.
The Dylan influence can be heard in the combining of acoustic and electric elements. Aaron Krerowicz suggests that this ‘maturation’ came partly from listening to his musical friend/rival:
The recording
I’ll Follow the Sun was recorded on the 18th October 1964, with all eight takes completed on a single day. Paul provided the lead vocal, bass and both electric and acoustic guitar, with John (on acoustic) and George in their customary roles.
Ringo is listed as providing percussion but it is unclear how this was achieved. Macdonald speculates that he is ‘slapping the top of an acoustic guitar’. The harmony vocal on the verse is also disputed — it is listed as John but sounds like George (their voices could sound similar — on Anna, for example). Others have suggested that Paul is double-tracked.
The final take dropped the instrumental break for a restatement of the melody on electric guitar. This elegant, economical touch have been at the suggestion of George Martin, who later declared it his favourite track on Beatles for Sale.
Interestingly, the new I’ll Follow the Sun sounds less Dylanesque than the earlier one. The subtle interplay between the instrumentation and the precise diction of the the vocal recalls an older idol, Buddy Holly.
Critical Reaction
Beatles For Sale was generally considered a disappointment — and evidence that The Beatles punishing schedule was catching up with them.
Ian Macdonald detects evidence of this in the supposedly limited ambition shown in I’ll Follow the Sun and waspishly comments:
Despite the song’s brevity, its unresolved stepwise sequence soon palls
Perhaps better to judge I’ll Follow the Sun as a foretaste of what will come in the Abbey Road medley. A sample perhaps— but one that brilliantly affirms McCartney’s advancing musical sophistication.
